Greatest. Day. Ever.

Station 18 (Our station!) hook and ladder (My favorite!) parked right in front of Westridge Rec Center on Wednesday morning. This is as close as it gets to a celebrity sighting around here. The firefighters must have been inside the building on some non emergency call as there was no one with the truck.

Neither kid wanted their picture taken with the truck. But, I say you can't pass up an opportunity like this one. And, since I'm the mama... "I'm not smiling because I'm not cool with this." - Madelyn. Bah humbug! Next time I'll have Madelyn take MY picture in front of the firetruck.

Pool time!

One of our favorite things about the Westin Kierland - there are many to choose from - is the swimming pool. Last year, the weather was overcast and cool for two of our three days which is very unusual for Arizona. Not so this year! We had 70 and 80 degree weather with clear skies the whole time and it was great.

Saturday and Sunday mornings, we spent a nice chunk of time swimming, floating in the lazy river, and riding the water slide. Poppie really enjoyed the lazy river while Madelyn couldn't get enough of the water slide.

After her first trip down with Griff, she said, "I want to do that one or two...or maybe five more times!" In all, she went down twice with Griff and a handful of times with me. She would have ridden it more but it was getting close to lunch time and In N Out was calling.

Playing with a new circus elephant pool toy.

Poolside in the shade.

Lazy river time.

Happy girl.

Splash!

Without sounding like a commercial, I have nothing but good things to say about the Kierland. It's the perfect place for a young family or an old family or a couple to vacation. Great location, beautiful hotel and grounds, excellent service...and delicious s'mores.

Rockies pre season game

Day two of our Spring break trip to Arizona included a Rockies pre season game at Salt River Fields against the LA Angels. We sat in the outfield lawn and caught most of the game. We even had a spot of shade which stayed with us throughout most of the afternoon. The weather was perfect and the company was good. Rumor has it, the Rockies even pulled off a victory.

Meeting Dinger. No tears here!

Post ice cream mustache. (Can you guess the flavor?) And, a happy boy.

 Tuckered out.

Thanks for the lift, Poppie.

Arizona 2014

We spent Spring Break 2014 in Scottsdale, Arizona. Honey and Poppie came with us this year, too! Our trip lasted three nights -- Friday through Monday -- and we stayed at the Westin Kierland. The weather was terrific this year. No rain! And, once again, the Kierland proved to be an outstanding, accommodating, family friendly resort.

Notable memories include:

* Kids First Class on the airplane.

* Friday and Saturday evening s'mores. Somehow, there was confusion when s'mores weren't available on Sunday. I'm not sure who was more upset - Griff and Poppie or Madelyn and Sawyer.

* Boy bed and girl bed in our hotel room. Madelyn wanted to continue this after our return home but Griff and I vetoed.

* Family breakfast in the club room.

* Trying to sneak up on Honey and Poppie's room only to have our plan foiled by the time we made it down the hall. We don't travel quietly especially when someone has to be first and someone else doesn't agree.

* Pool time. (See post to follow.)

* Child sized Candy Crush throughout the hotel. Or, so Sawyer thought.

* Rockies game. (See post to follow.)

* In N Out. Enough said.

* Cruising around Phoenix six passengers deep in a rented Dodge Caravan. Sooo cool.

Thanks, Griff, for very fun Spring break trip. And, thank you, Honey and Poppie for coming along. We had a great time and made lots of memories that I know the kids will fondly remember.

Friends and cousins having breakfast.

Life these days.

Sawyer: We're having a festival.

Me: What kind of festival are you having? A Not-Listening-To-Your-Mother festival?

Madelyn: Not that. Totally not that.

Me thinks I'm losing ground against these two.

Gingerbread house

Last weekend, we made a gingerbread house. Sort of. The kids and I picked up a kit at Target. Griff and I assembled the building and let the kids decorate.

All was going well. Sawyer was in charge of the sidewalk as he had too heavy a touch to be putting candy directly on the house.

They were good little decorators. Worked well as a team.

Even stopped to sample the candy along the way. Someone had to make sure it was the proper quality for our gingerbread house.

However, we had a structural breach and the whole house collapsed.

Not to worry. The kids continued to decorate the pieces. As a bonus, it no longer mattered how hard Sawyer pushed as he couldn't knock down the house!

In the end, we had no gingerbread house to display. But, at least we had fun!

Best friends

"Whoa...cool."

Cherry picker inside the rec center ALL the way up at the ceiling replacing the light fixtures.

Needless to say, Sawyer was not the only little person eagerly watching this project.

More Sawyer speak.

"Batman night light. Superman underwear." - A discussion with himself regarding a nightlight we saw at Pottery Barn Kids this morning.

"I can hold this in the crotch of my knee." - Holding the blue magic wand behind his knee and clearly impressed with himself.

And, much to my surprise, the Lorax costume which we found originally priced at $70 in August was on final clearance for $19.97. Hooray! Bought it and brought it home. NEITHER KID WANTS ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT. I'll leave the tags on and resell on eBay for a profit (hopefully) next Fall. Darn!